Morbid and Creepifying
by hijklmnop
Summary: Today he's a painter. Today, he has ten, neat little corpses lined up in a row, slumped against the side of the building as Joker dances to each one, leaps throughout them as if he's skipping through a field of flowers rather than a line of baddies.


Today he's a painter.

Today, he has ten, neat little corpses lined up in a row, slumped against the side of the building as Joker dances to each one, leaps throughout them as if he's skipping through a field of flowers rather than a line of baddies, muchly post-mortem. He has a pallet, he has a paintbrush, and he has a line of white, a line of black, and a line of bright, bright red.

'Painting the Roses Red', he sings, while he's up to something like this. Hums it to himself, hums it to one of his thugs, hums it to Harley if she pays attention long enough while he drags the paintbrush wide and chaotic across a pair of cold, dead, unmoving lips.

Painting, painting, painting, painting, painting the roses red.

He knows he messes up the tune of it, sometimes, thinks of 'Follow the Yellow Brick Road' and things sparkly and child-like rather than Alice in Wonderland. Did you know someone hanged his or herself on the set of The Wizard of Oz? Because the Joker knew that someone had hanged his or herself on the set of The Wizard of Oz.

It's just strange, is all. It's just... Things get all mulled up in his head, they blend together and mix and match and stitch and unstitch, like a ball of yarn, like a pile of intestines, and he just gets confused. He gets confused and he goes with the flow, rather than fight it, because it's the only way he knows how to function. It's the only way he knows how to survive, standing back and admiring his artwork, moving onto the next victim and dragging his paintbrush through a gob of scarlet paint.

Painting the roses red.

* * *

Today he's a pilot!

Today, he's free as the wind blows his hair and he wears the giant goggles like real pilots do as he drops food for those poor, starving citizens of Africa. It's a real help, jars of peanut butter and free sandwiches, all spiced with that perfect zest of Smilex, that flavor that everybody knows and loves.

He likes days like this. He likes days where he can just sit back and kick his legs up onto the steering wheel. Kill people without much of a fuss. He lives for days like this.

* * *

Today he's a thief.

Today, he steals a lollipop from a four-year-old girl.

It was cherry-flavored.

* * *

Today he has no pants on.

Wait, let's backtrack a little.

Today he's pushed The Bat Man to the edge.

Today, he's shot Sarah Gordon in the head, and somebody is very Not Happy about this fact. The Bat Man and Jim Gordon are pretty close, see, and Joker doesn't think Batman appreciates his shooting the guy's best friend's wife. In the face. It was a little unnecessarily close, to be honest, but he just needed to. Not even because he really wanted to, not something that he had a particularly fun time doing. He just... did things, sometimes. Cause and effect. Some kind of experiment.

Batman doesn't look happy about this, and Joker doesn't blame him. But then again, he doesn't think it's entirely about the whole 'best friend's wife getting shot' thing. He thinks it's a lot to do with The Bat Man having a lot of issues with relationships, and he tells him right out. He thinks this is about The Bat Man being afraid of getting close to people, being afraid ever since his Lovely Lady, Dent's Lovely Lady, got herself blowed-ed up not too long ago. He thinks this is about intimacy issues, and he giggles it out to Batman, shot kneecap and all, even when the guy punches him hard across the jaw, especially when he shoves Joker into the Arkham cell, the solitary confinement, throws him hard down onto the cot mattress and growls like he means it.

"It's not my fault you have problems getting close to anyone!" he laughs out, and Batman jars his arm back, hard, click-clicks his shoulder out with an edible pop.

"Shut up."

"Oh, no, wait, it is!"

"SHUT UP!"

Even as there's tears springing to his eyes, of pain or of joy or of something experiencing emotion. Even when Batman wrenches his arm into that angle, even when Joker bucks back and goads him on, laughing the whole way. "You have no one to be with. No one to hug, to hold, to make love to. No one."

Even when he's on all fours, and it's somehow escalated to The Bat Man, the One and Only, bucking into him hard, and it's only on the one last shove that he finally buckles under his own weight, the laugh breaks off into some kind of wretched shout of pain into the pillow, his first of the night since Gordon pounded him full of lead. And when the look of horror finds its way into Batman's expression, when the cell slams shut and Joker clutches his limp arm to him and flips over to look at the cracks in the ceiling, all he can do is keep tight-lipped, raw and spluttering, and the giggles follow Batman all the way down the hallway.

Horror upon horrors.

* * *

Today he's everybody.

Today, he's an engineer. He's a priest, he's a prostitute, he's a stripper and a mathematician and a seamstress and a candyman and a psychiatrist and a veterinarian and a construction worker and a butcher and a grocer and a farmer and an ironsmith and a soda tester and a shoemaker and a candle stick holder and an elephant and he's bleeding and he's a warrior and a worrier and a soccer mom and a hockey mom and a football mom (if there are even football moms) and a wine-maker and a liquor store owner and a television repairman and a plumber and a train operator and an electrician and a CIA agent and a professional stuntman and an explosives expert.

Today he's everybody

Today he's nobody.

Today he's so many personalities blended into one big, fuzzy area, he's not entirely sure who he is anymore, what his name is, his social security number, his birthday, his mom or his dad. Today he's kind of overwhelmed by the world, and this is what happens when he isn't him, when he doesn't go with the flow, when he looks around and sees a stark, white, cracked reality, that he really is in Arkham, that he really is batshit insane, that his arms are strapped to his own torso by sleeves and buckles that are too long and too itchy.

He's scared, but only for a minute, because it's all he allows himself.

It's all he allows a real personality to come through, before it hits him. He's taking this way too seriously. He's taking it like an actual situation, like an actual human being, something he hasn't had the right to be for so long. He's losing it, and it's the crazy house that's supposed to be making him saner that's making him lose it, and that's all irony, isn't it?

It's bloody hilarious is what it is.

Even the horse tranquilizers don't stop him from laughing that night.

* * *

Today he's messy.

Today, he has a girl laid out in front of him in pieces. Today he felt like destroying something beautiful, picked a random girl off the street - blonde, like he's always loved and hated in one big package. Today, he's peeled off her skin and wrapped her body parts in bows. Today, he's left this girl, this poor girl, scalp and all, in a box on Commissioner Gordon's front steps.

Today, he leaves a bloody knife, and a note attached to the package.

Today, the note reads Happy Birthday, Jimmy! Hope it's as special as my morning was!

Today, he kind of hopes Gordon realizes there's a bomb inside before he blows up.

Today he also kind of hopes not.

Today he walks down the street whistling, hands tucked into his pockets, but not before leaving a cheery Joker card pinned to the outside of Commissioner Gordon's door, fingerprinted with blood and dirt.

* * *

Today is another easy day.

Today, he steals more candy from kids.

It's so fun to hear them wail all the way down the street.

* * *

Today he's finished.

Today, he has Batman's fist coiled hard into his vest, one leg dangling uselessly underneath him, crumpled from a fall. It's an all-out, balls-out fight - they always are - and Joker's not so sure what he knows about upper hands anymore, what he knows about winning. It's all wrong but it's all right because The Bat Man's immovable, The Bat Man's a stubborn son of a bitch and all he has to do is drop the Joker over the ledge. All his fingers have to do is slip, all he needs is one weak moment and this is all done. But he won't.

He won't and he never will (even though he's always wanted to). Joker's not sure he'd ever lose, or if he'd ever win, and neither and both have always been enough but sometimes he just gets tired. Sometimes he tests his limits just to make sure he can still bleed.

The building's ablaze and you can hear the unmistakable shrieks of orphans inside. Children, too many, enough and nothing Batman can do for them, it's too late. It's Joker's masterpiece, his homage to a Bruce Wayne, but he knows how touchy The Bat Man gets about children without parents. Over a dozen innocent children dead, over a decade of poking and prodding and pushing, over two days of planning the best possible way to make old Bats squirm, and the guy still isn't far enough gone to just end it.

Twisted metal, industrial wires and barbs drawn up like a bow.

"You know," the Joker pants, and paws his way up Batman's cape, up the spattering rain and all the silk-woven failure. "You and I, we've had something special. We're unique. New and exciting. Strong. Thirteen years to the day and you still won't topple far enough to break your one rule."

"Shut up." Space of a scowl and a blood-curdling snarl for him to get out his words. "You're going home. Don't think--"

"When men in the older days, in medieval times, had failed so outright as I have," Joker interrupted, smirked a smile and grabbed hard onto Batman's shoulders, ratcheting himself just enough to get a hold, to lean in real close. "They would throw themselves onto their swords." He ducks his lips against Batman's throat, snags his fingers into those two eyeholes, the closest thing to a family he wants. "It was all for you," he hisses as the mask starts to slink backwards, and The Bat Man, that North Star, jerks back quick enough to knock Joker off-kilter.

Still, he hangs on, digs his nails in hard as two blades snik-snik their way out of, what, gloves? Gauntlets? Cuffs? Joker doesn't really know what they are but they hurt when they tear through velvet and cotton and three layers of skin, organs included, this he knows, he just doesn't give it much of a passing comment as he stumbles back. There's just kind of a wink and rain-spattered teeth and a token smile as he slumps back, grasps the blade with both hands and gives a hard jerk.

"You just couldn't leave things be," Batman seethes as he crouches next to Joker - Bruce does, as he watches a single rivulet of blood bubble up over his lips and trickle down all watery with rain. And Joker chortles high and false as flames lick their way up to the rooftop, as Batman grips Joker's fist hard and tries to tug the blade from his hand. "You can never leave things be." It's crippled and weary, just like everything else between them. Just like how threadbare and rotted this line linking them has gotten.

"Look who's talking," Joker laughs back, all cackling hyena for a brief few seconds before he musters up the nerve to actually explain himself. "I paralyzed your best friend's daughter. Tried to drive him insane. I killed the girl of your dreams. Rachel Dawes, I blew her up, remember that? I've tried to kill you more times than I can count. Locked you in a lunatic asylum. Threw you out seven windows that I can think of. I killed Robin." Joker grabbed onto Batman's arm and jerked him in close enough to see him good and simple. "I beat the little brat's head in with a crowbar and riddled him with dynamite. Yeah, I did that."

He shakes Batman, fingers snagging in hard as he drags himself a little closer, lets the blood ooze and the fist punch into his wound and the blade slink its way through his skin as he gets himself all near as he can. "Thirteen years of this shit, and you still can't kill me? You're pathetic."

But he's not pathetic. He's not, he's the strongest person Joker knows. He's stubborn and bull-headed and it doesn't matter how much Joker throws at him, the guy will never budge, not a damn inch. He's an unstoppable force, immortal, untouched by dynamite, by guns, Joker's run him over with a bus before and Batman just kept on going. He's not pathetic, he's so entirely un-pathetic that Joker doesn't know what to do with himself sometimes, and he loves Batman for it, he wants to marry the guy. Except he also hates said guy, and he'd want nothing more than to watch one, single bullet squish him right between the eyes.

It's getting real hot now, Joker smiles a smile full of teeth and blood and malice back at Batman, slumps back as he relinquishes his hold on the blades. "You'd better run. Capes catch fire quickly, don't they?" he coughs, spatters up a little more red and tries to push himself up against the ledge. He's not going too far, those went in deep. But he'll get out of it. He always gets out of it. He never gets out of it. Joker kicks him hard in the shin and snarls as the flames start lashing in closer, surrounding them. "Skedaddle, Mommy and Daddy are waiting for you."

"You just couldn't leave things be," Batman repeats himself, draws up the blade and leans in close enough to breathe that rancid breath and grit his teeth together. He hates Joker. He pities Joker. He's never been entirely sure what to do with him, what to do with this. "I hate you."

"I love you."

"Don't do that."

He pities him.

"What are you going to do, kill me?"

He hates him.

"Over a decade and you think just now you'll suddenly change your mind?"

He loves him.

Enough to press that blade in tight, to carve it across Joker's throat, one last act of remorse, of condolence, some kind of ironic as it paints a crimson streak from ear to ear, a mirror to that Glasgow smile, already frothing with red, redder than red, red as the makeup that streaks his face, paints up a grin and never seems to slacken. Joker splutters and coughs and he might have even gotten out a thank you if he could do much else than hold tight to Batman's arm, tilt his head back and let rills of scarlet delineate words and swears and thirteen years of something all down his throat.

And as Batman straightens, horror should have been painting his face, something should have been there when he leans in real close and breathes that he's sorry, when he knows that he should be anything but. The blade clatters to the cement rooftop with one slick motion, Batman stands, and through blood and sweat and fire, Joker does what he does best. He tilts his head back and giggles, cackles, howls with something hilarious and side-splitting - quite literally - that only he understands. It comes up like a blood-spattered gurgle but it's unmistakable. And Batman backs away, watches the flames swallow the Joker whole before he takes that one final leap from the roof top and tries to shut his eyes and ears to a whole lot of sights and sounds.

Batman always knew Joker would have the last laugh.

He just didn't know it would be the one echoing in his head for the rest of his life.


End file.
